


After the Storm

by logdate_unknown



Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Laboratories
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-13
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:54:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26432986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/logdate_unknown/pseuds/logdate_unknown
Summary: The worst thing that can happen, happens.It's a lot of work, recovering from being experimented on, then left for dead. Zim's not alone, though. Not anymore.
Relationships: Zim & OC
Comments: 6
Kudos: 14





	After the Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Hi!! How is everyone? Weathering the distressing state of the world? Hopefully! Sending positive vibes!  
> This fic is kind of a rewrite of that other fic I abandoned, but kinda completely different also. It includes Ursula, the scientist character I've written about before, but this story is separate from anything else I've written about with her in it. It's very, very angsty, but there's gonna be a lot of catharsis and comfort in it too. I never leave any hurt unresolved. Some parts I'm still planning out, so I will update tags accordingly! The chapters will be short, so hopefully I'll update in a timely manner!
> 
> IF YOU'RE A ZADR OR ANYTHING SIMILAR, GET OUT. I CAN'T STAND YOU. YOU ARE MORALLY BANKRUPT.
> 
> To everyone else, thank you!! Enjoy!!

The dramatic overhaul of the laboratory was as stressful as much as it was necessary, and relieving. Like clearing out an infestation. In certain spots, that was more like the truth than in others. It was distressing to see the animals they'd been keeping, and the various forms of abuse exercised on them... none of which were truly worth describing, to anyone. Ursula Perez had never seen anything quite as bad, and she was convinced that the things she'd seen during cleanup would keep her up for a minimum of weeks.

While working in the industry, she'd come across several various other labs in competition with theirs whose practices left something to be desired, and with the monopoly of their company growing, it had luckily become easier and easier to change these, and she was grateful to be a part of their coming under new management.

This city in particular was... Not good. She didn't even want to think about the state of that school. Or- 'skool.' The hell with it. One thing at a time.

Right now, she just had to make a brief overview of each room in the lab, make a note of which rooms were for which, now that a good deal of them had been cleaned out, and the living things within resituated and fed. One wing she came across felt... eerier, than the others. It was the quality of light. Dimmer, and bluer. Ursula almost expected some shadowy figure to be waiting at the end of the hall the next corner she came around. It was quiet, too. Other than the buzzing of the bluish gray lights and the white, white walls. 

Had this sector even been in use? There wasn’t much to find. Empty containment cells, and some examination rooms, as well as storage rooms with the adequate paraphernalia- you know, test tubes and masks and such. She had a feeling her coworkers had not come here yet, and she was tempted to go back to her superiors to let them know, so they could do what they had done to the other sections before she could come back and check on things.

Well, as long as she was here, she thought it wouldn't hurt to have a look.

Down the last long hall, before the dead end of the entire floor, there was a metal door at the end. It almost looked like an industrial freezer door. She stopped in her tracks for a good long moment, her hand hovering over her walkie. How tempting it was to have someone else take care of this for her, so that she didn't have to go in there. But this was her job. And it wasn't like she didn't already have the security override loaded into her key card on the end of her lanyard. It was time to be brave, now.

It was so... cold, down there. Ursula tried so hard to maintain her fear, and knew she would be jumpy. Lord help her if any equipment happened to fall. Never mind. She carded the door, waited for the beep, and struggled only a little to yank it open by the long handle. Behind that door, there was another lighter door. She carded it, opened it up, and breathed slowly and quietly. 

It was dark. In the closed twilight, she sounded so loud. All the things on her keychain were much louder now. Uneasy, she lifted her hand to turn on the little pen light on her lanyard, then jumped a foot high when the lights automatically activated. Her breath caught immediately at the other, warmer color of light she spotted behind a panel of glass, halfway down the stretch in front of her, with a few pale gray shadows stretching to the other side.

Something wasn’t right. All alarms were blaring in the silence. If there had been someone else with her, she would have exchanged glances with them. Whatever had been being kept in here… was probably much larger. More dangerous than simple cats and dogs and mice. How else would it have been kept under such security, so far from the other test subjects?

Of course, she had to proceed. She didn’t look too closely at the glass wall. Ursula didn’t want to stare whatever it was in the face if she saw it immediately. The glass was coated in deep furrows of scratching, long slashes that fanned out in fine cracks. 

When she came across it, however, she just barely stopped moving out of skittishness. 

The containment chamber was mostly empty, but for a round conduit on the ceiling, where there was a folded armature with a clawed hand, and a dispenser Ursula recognized that was meant to shove food through, near the floor on the far side. And a bed, in the corner, where a little yellow body lay very still. 

It was anticlimactic, for how much she had built it up in her mind. But squinting at it, looking closer, she saw it looked like no animal she knew of. The first thing she thinks is that it is either hibernating, or dead. Nothing is ever that still, even in sleep. Sleeping things dream and turn and snore. This little thing didn’t move, and laid halfway on its side, halfway on its front, unnaturally, as if it had been thrown there. Its head faced the wall. She could see a little hand resting there beside it, with three fine and delicate little fingers. At first she thought it had a thin blue blanket over it, but recognized it as a little gown it was wearing, instead. 

This was no animal. Animals did not warrant wearing gowns or having fingers. But it didn’t look as if it was in any position to attack or bite her. So she searched for an entry, to come and check on it. The seam of the doorway was almost invisible- and she didn’t think she would have even noticed it if it weren’t for the key card port, in which she shakenly slid her card, and pushed the glass forward.

There was a burnt smell to the room- a chemical tang to the air. She recognized burn streaks on the stone floor. Beside the bed, halfway under it, there was a dark gray stain. For the moment, as soon as she heard the breathing, the little click at the sound of each inhale, she wasn’t sure whether she should be relieved. Or if she should be wearing gloves to handle it. Or- even if she should be breathing the same air. 

Ursula leaned to one side to see the face and frowned deeper at the front facing eyes and parted mouth, where she could see odd, flat pink teeth. 

An alien, she realized. This was why-

But how could they leave it here? Ursula had far too many questions to be shocked. From what she could see, it was alive, it was breathing, and all alone in this freezing, empty laboratory. As she approached, cautiously, she tried to pinpoint when exactly all the previous employees had gone. The overhaul had begun last week, before she’d been assigned to this building, and it had been shut down only the day before the clearing and the firing had begun. She coldly realized that the creature had to have been alone for a minimum of five days. 

Ursula felt shameful of how high she jumped as its finger twitched. Something black moved, like a little insect, and she saw the antennae, halfway pinned under its head. She was only just comfortable enough to sit on the cot beside its little three-toed bird’s feet. All the while only just believing what she was seeing, fearful and bewildered. To test it, she snapped her fingers, holding her hand close to its head, then drawing it back in an instant. She did this twice, and perhaps something in its face twitched, but nothing else happened for the long few moments where she had no idea how to proceed. She was growing more comfortable around it at the same time she was growing more confused, with so many more questions. 

When it shifted, she yelped in fright, jumping up to her feet and almost back toward the glass, where she watched the little frail body try to twist itself to face her, the dark wet flash of eyes just barely open making her stomach sink. It tried to sit up, bringing its arms underneath, then having one claw grip the bed, trembling all the way up to the elbow. It swallowed down breaths like its throat was halfway closed, and blinked at her with huge pink eyes. The narrow chest heaved like it was starting to cough, and its breath rasped forward until its head flopped over enough to start heaving. 

“Oh,” she says, feeling suddenly embarrassed for being so frightened, and feeling even more concerned than the moment she understood how long it must have been alone. Touching it was less of a concern now than it was getting it warm and fed like the other creatures that had been mistreated. There were whispers of what to do after this, after she learned if it could communicate with her, what it ate and drank, but for now she thought that she didn’t care about danger as much as she was frightened the little thing was very, very close to death. 

The moment she got closer her confidence grew. As it heaved, the gown parted in the back, little nubs of protruding spine leading up to a metal object, heavily dented in on one side. It was like the back of a pink and gray ladybug carapace, and endeared the creature to her further. The sounds it made were so horrible in the silence. It was as if he couldn’t get enough air in or out to heave up- nothing, most likely. It would take something completely indigestible to still be in any system for as long as he’d been alone. She looked around and didn’t see a latrine of any kind. Why would there be a food slot and no-

The alien gagged weakly, then sucked in a gurgling breath. She was there before it could fall back, gathering up its narrow shoulders and heavy head. She held it off to one side, just in case it should spit up anything, and she only had to wait a moment or two while he finished heaving before she pulled it close, letting it lean and rest on her shoulder. It coughed a little, struggling, and she could feel its distressingly weak shudders of inhales. 

Fortunately, the touch of its skin wasn’t making her melt or spontaneously combust just yet, so she brought her hand up to stroke the protruding cheekbone with her thumb, using the other wrapped around its torso to feel around its ribcage, squeezing gently at it in hopes that she can stimulate it to breathe a little deeper now that it was upright. All the little bones, like grasping at a miniature skeleton covered in a thin cloth, distressed her. It had gone more than five days without eating, that was for damn sure. 

“Shhh,” she soothed after hearing it grunt. Its face did not change. She went up to touch the firm, wiry antennae. Thin but durable. When she came back down its face, she drew back her hand when she realized she had touched its tongue, which had lolled out down its jaw, long enough to almost touch its chest. Recoiling a little, she tried to push it back into its mouth, but realized that it could be helping its breathing. 

Ursula kept talking to it, hoping for some other kind of response, working some warmth into its little clawed hands by rubbing at them, since they were frigid to the touch. The little doll sized hands were incredible to her, even though they were bony, like little bird claws. As she worked, something began to unlock and shake loose, because the breaths were much deeper, if a little hoarse and squeaky. Good. 

Her thoughts were as slow as they were frantic. Trying to think of which next steps to take. It would do nothing to wonder what these assholes had been thinking, leaving it here to die. Or what they had been doing. It clearly wasn’t in good health, and probably hadn’t been for a long time. 

She felt movement on her hand and saw that it had begun to curl its fingers around hers. Just barely, and not all the way, but it was. Ursula shrugged the mass of dark curly hair from her ponytail away from her shoulder and saw no change to its cold yellow face. She saw sentience and intelligence in the hollows around huge glossy eyes, shut behind dark furrows and greenish bags, stressed with thin wrinkles. Her heart was breaking. 

It was time to find a way to get it into her car.

**Author's Note:**

> Don't worry!! Things will get better!! Zim is tough, he'll make it through okay, especially with a sweetheart like Ursula. 
> 
> (I request that if you decide to leave comments, don't comment about your stance on anti-zadr! I appreciate your support, but I would love to hear what people think about the story, instead! Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you all have a wonderful day.)


End file.
